Trames Nos.2, 4, 8 : F-X.Roth / Les Siecles

Martin Matalon: Trames

Trames II
Trames IV
Trames VIII

Florence Cioccolani (piano)
Maude Gratton (harpsichord)
Eriko Minami (marimba)
Les Siecles / Francois Xavier Roth, conductor

Live Recorded: 11/2009

Born in Buenos Aires in 1958, Martin Matalon studied at the Boston Conservatory of Music and the Juilliard. Among his many awards, he has also received a Guggenheim fellowship and a Fulbright scholarship to France (1988).

In 1993, having settled in Paris, the composer collaborated for the first time with IRCAM and worked on La Rosa profunda, music for an exhibition at the Pompidou Centre on The Universe of Borges. The following year, IRCAM commissioned a new score for the restored version of Fritz Lang’s silent film, Metropolis.

After that considerable work, Martin Matalon turned to the universe of Luis Bunuel, consecutively writing scores for three legendary surrealistic films by the Spanish director: Las Siete vidas de un gato (1996), for Un Chien andalou (1927), Le Scorpion (2001) for L’Age d’or (1931) and Traces II (la cabra) (2005) for Las Hurdes (terre sans Pain) (1932).

His catalogue also includes a large number of chamber and orchestral works. Begun in 1997, the series of Trames, borderline works between solo concerto writing and chamber music, and Traces, conceived for solo instruments and real time processing, constitutes a sort of compositional diary for their author, forming an important part of his catalogue. Trame IV was recorded live at La Rochelle; Trames II & VIII in Arles in November 2009.